Leaven Leaven

Volume 14 Issue 1 The Gospel of John Article 2

1-1-2006

Editors' Notes Editors' Notes

Stuart Love slove@pepperdine.edu

D'Esta Love dlove@pepperdine.edu

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Recommended Citation Recommended Citation Love, Stuart and Love, D'Esta (2006) "Editors' Notes," Leaven: Vol. 14 : Iss. 1 , Article 2. Available at: https://digitalcommons.pepperdine.edu/leaven/vol14/iss1/2

This Editor's Notes is brought to you for free and open access by the Religion at Pepperdine Digital Commons. It has been accepted for inclusion in Leaven by an authorized editor of Pepperdine Digital Commons. For more information, please contact Katrina.Gallardo@pepperdine.edu, anna.speth@pepperdine.edu, linhgavin.do@pepperdine.edu.

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f Editors' NotesD'EsTA LOVE AND STUART LOVE

Over the years we have found great joy in studying and teaching the Gospel of John. We have mar-veled at its uniqueness, which we see in its organization and sense of geography and chronology,in its collection of narratives and signs that appear nowhere else in scripture, and in the author's

development of themes and use of figurative language. However, we have observed that in finding modelsfor ministry, the tendency in our churches has been to turn to the Synoptic Gospels and/or to the letters ofPaul rather than the Gospel of John. Yet, there is richness in John's use of themes and metaphors that yieldgreat benefit as we explore this writing in light of Christian ministry. No theme is more significant to minis-try than incarnation, which informs other Johannine themes such as love, bearing fruit, pastoral care, seekingand finding, sending and mutual abiding. We believe that exploring ministry through the Gospel of John willbring fresh insights and new language to ministries that have largely been informed by other New Testamentwritings.

As is our tradition, we devote one issue of Leaven each year to the theme of the Pepperdine BibleLectures. In 1995 we published an issue of the Gospel of John and now, ten years later, we return to theFourth Gospel, which was the theme of the 62nd Annual Bible Lectures. While the lectures focused uponthe passion narratives in John's Gospel, the emphasis for Leaven is upon the rich themes related to ministrythroughout the Gospel as a whole. Included in this issue are five papers presented at the Leaven symposiumand one theme lecture, all of which were included in the May 2005 Pepperdine Bible Lectures.

The issue opens with articles presented at the Leaven symposium. Beginning with the first chapter ofJohn, D'Esta Love follows the threads of three intertwiningthemes throughout the Gospel as a whole: dis-cipleship, seeking and finding, and mutual indwelling. Through Jesus' invitation to "Come and see" the jour-ney of discipleship leads to the place where God dwells, and we discover a place of mutual indwelling fromwhich all Christian ministry receives itauthenticity and power. David Lertis Matson, through the theme ofsending, also gives a broad view of the Gospel and provides a Trinitarian vision of the God who sends, Jesusas the model apostle (the sent one), and the Paraclete who is sent to indwell the church. In a sending matrix,as John delineates it, Jesus follows the pattern of the sending God of heaven, as he sends the church. Theecclesiology of John's Gospel is that the church itself is the great apostle sent in imitation of Jesus into theworld. Paul M. Blowers brings a sacramental interpretation to the Bread of Life discourse in John 6.51-58,placed within the historical framework of the Stone Campbell movement and recent Johannine scholarship.As he reads the text afresh, informed by the richness of John's themes of incarnation and mutual indwelling,he finds in this discourse of eucharistic feeding a drama of Christ's incarnation that is still unfolding in thelife, worship and sacramental rituals of the church. Thomas Robinson invites us to imagine the events ofJohn 13, set within the context of what Jesus knew when he prepared to wash the disciples' feet. The ques-tion for ministry is "If you knew God had given everything into your hands, what would you do?" Jesustook a basin and a towel and in so doing manifested his glory and bound a new vision of ministry to thelife of the community that called the disciples and calls us to the imitation of Jesus in the work of his love.Jeanene Reese turns to the final chapter of John in which Jesus appears to disciples on the seashore. Theprovision of a simple meal becomes the basis once again for fellowship with him and each other, recalling

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Love and Love: Editors' Notes

Published by Pepperdine Digital Commons, 2006

THE GOSPEL OF JOHN LEAVEN 3

the hospitality they experienced before they denied him and left him to die alone. As they experience restora-tion, a renewed call to discipleship, and the charge to tend his sheep, we are reminded that ministry is donein the presence of the Risen Lord and by his power to restore and to set us on the path of ministry in hisname.

With this issue of Leaven, Stuart Love begins a series of articles devoted to metaphors for ministry inJohn's Gospel as an example of doing practical theology. In part 1 of the series he presents two metaphors:incarnation and the world and affirms that if the means of ministry is the Spirit working through the flesh,the object of ministry is the world. We have included David Fleer's keynote address, "Lifted Up." Throughthis sermon he draws us away from the image-makers of our world and invites us to inhabit the worldimagined in John's Gospel. As we listen to the voices in John's narrative (12.20-36), observe the scene as itunfolds, and hear Jesus speak forthrightly of his death, we look back on the sounds and images of our worldand find them wanting. The sermon calls us back as we yearningly turn again to the world of scripture forJesus to speak words of life and to draw us toward him as he is lifted up from the earth. Finally, our issuecloses with another powerful liturgical reading by Lee Magness, "I AM HE: A Reading from John 18-2\;"

Future issues of Leaven include "Ephesians," edited by David Holmes, "The Future of the RestorationMovement," edited by David Fleer, "Missions," edited by Sonny Guild, "The Church," edited by C. RobertWetzel and Philip D. Kenneson, and "I John," edited by Stuart and D'Esta Love.

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Leaven, Vol. 14 [2006], Iss. 1, Art. 2

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